Jazz Articles about Nicole Mitchell

Nicole Mitchell: Awakening

by Jerry D'Souza
October 11, 2011

Flautist Nicole Mitchell is visionary. Her music clasps a wide panorama of styles and sounds in a constant quest for the new, as she opens up a sonic spectrum that moves from quiet interludes to scintillating rhythmic motifs. Mitchell brings the flute up front on this CD, working with a quartet rather than the larger ensembles she has employed in the past. This gives the music intimacy yet, as with all of her recordings, has a tensile layer ...

Nicole Mitchell: Awakening

by Jack Huntley
August 23, 2011

Flautist Nicole Mitchell's generous improvisational abilities are at the musical heart of Awakening. Not only does she move effortlessly from single-note lines and sliding honks to wispy, soft timbres, but she is equally comfortable moving from pure melodic phrasing to more experimental, free content. Coupled with an exceptional trio backing, Mitchell's album crackles with infectious spontaneity. Her music manages to be at once reflective and energetic, accessible as well as clever. “Curly Top" kicks of the set ...

Joelle Leandre - Nicole Mitchell - Dylan Van Der Schyff: Before After

by AAJ Italy Staff
April 13, 2011

Registrato al Festival di Vancouver del 2009, questo incontro tra tre forti personalità della scena impro richiede, come è intuibile, anche all'ascoltatore le giuste sintonie. Ma incuriosisce sin dalle prime note l'interazione tra il contrabbasso di Joëlle Léandre, i flauti di Nicole Mitchell e le percussioni di Dylan Van Der Schyff, artisti con percorsi personali molto differenti e proprio per questo in grado di condividere liberamente elementi lessicali mobili. Quattro improvvisazioni che scavano in più direzioni, quella timbrica in primis, ...

Nicole Mitchell's Sonic Projections: Emerald Hills

by John Sharpe
November 22, 2010

In some ways Chicago-based flautist Nicole Mitchell's Emerald Hills resembles an old style AACM record: there's an adventurous spirit, a diversity of approaches, and chops to burn. More recent reference points include Mitchell's own Xenogenesis Suite (Firehouse 12, 2008) but (largely) without the challenging vocals. Joining Mitchell in the quartet she calls Sonic Projections, are long time associate David Boykins on tenor saxophone, Craig Taborn on piano and Chad Taylor behind the traps. A lot of detail is ...

Nicole Mitchell's Sonic Projections: Emerald Hills

by AAJ Italy Staff
June 22, 2010

Oltre a essere un documento insostituibile e una fondamentale fonte di riflessione sul jazz creativo a Chicago e sulla musica sperimentale afroamericana degli ultimi quarantacinque anni, il libro del trombonista George Lewis A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music ha anche il merito, sebbene indiretto, di avere ispirato alla flautista Nicole Mitchell - che del nuovo corso dell'AACM è presidente - la formazione di questo quartetto chiamato Sonic Projections. Con la Mitchell ci sono il pianista ...

Nicole Mitchell: Renegades, Anaya, Collective Creativity

by Jeff Stockton
January 16, 2010

Nicple Mitchell's Black Earth Strings Renegades Delmark 2009 Indigo Trio Anaya Rogue Art 2009 Chicago Jazz Philharmonic Collective Creativity 3 Sixteen Records 2009

To call Nicole Mitchell the preeminent jazz flutist working in jazz today would be too limiting. Amid the ...

Nicole Mitchell's Black Earth Strings: Renegades

by Nic Jones
July 22, 2009

Here's where Nicole Mitchell's art comes together. Whereas her previous releases could have been marked by the perhaps inevitable signs of individuality coming into being, here the overall coherence of the music is extraordinary, aided in no small part by her choice of cohorts and their evidently strong commitment to group identity and singular music possessed of infinite variety and shades. In short, both Mitchell and the Black Earth Strings have come of age.

The knowledge of it starts from ...